“It could generate a lot of them too.”
She hummed, standing with the now softly sleeping baby in her arms. She walked the chubby baby across the room and nestled it in a pile of hand-woven afghans on the old couch. Carmelita breezed back into the room then, face fresh as ever, smile stretching both cheeks.
“Sit, sit, sweetheart. That tea needs a few more minutes for full effect.” She waved Tressa back to the kitchen.
“No, no, thank you. I’m not feeling so well. I think I just need to go to bed early tonight.”
“Ah.” Carmelita’s eyes burned up the space with mischief. “I like this plan. A lot of late nights in bed, huh?”
A blush the shade of the bougainvillea outside bloomed on my dove’s cheeks.
“Perhaps my tea is a little too late and already we’re expecting a new little one in the Santa Mariafamilia?” Carmelita’s grin stretched the expanse of her cheeks, glancing from me to Tressa then down to the sleeping baby on the couch.
“No!” Tressa shook her head quickly, backing toward that yellow door as fast as she could politely manage. “Thank you again. I’ll come back soon. I just…I need a minute.”
I stood from my seat at the table, meeting Carmelita at the front door and placing a gentle kiss on the side of her cheek.
Carmelita’s hands held my shoulders, soul shining like star fire in her eyes. “I want the best for you, Padre, but you can’t keep a girl like that chained. She was born to fly.”
I nodded, warmth radiating from the old woman straight into my soul. “I know, Ms. Carmelita.” I couldn’t fight the contented smile that tipped my lips. “And I’ve found everything I need alongside her.”
Carmelita tapped my cheek, smile softening. “Good. Then go do it differently.”
THIRTY-ONE
Bastien
By the time we left Carmelita’s, long after the sun had set the evening of Padre Juan Martin’s funeral, I’d come to some decisions. I’d be lying if I said I hadn’t briefly considered a life with her hidden up in the mountains just like my Jesuit brothers. Secluded areas had a way of keeping secrets close. But that life would only be a dishonor to her, never good enough, considering she was destined for the moon and stars.
But as far as I could tell, that left me with one last option.
Leaving.
I’d joined this order at the age of seventeen after my mother passed and the very roof over our heads was taken. I’d cried the day I packed up the iron crosses and priceless relics my family, generations of priests and holy men throughout the centuries, had collected and protected. Our pride in this faith was strong, something passed down and just as cherished as the relics I held in my hands.
Having a holy title attached to the Castaneda name felt natural.
And still, the nature of my time here felt iffy at best. From the receipts I’d presented to the cardinal in Philadelphia, evidence there was perhaps a history of negligence and abuse at St. Mike’s in some form, had rattled me so very much that I’d gone to the lengths to install an alarm especially for the children to use. It was a small step but just one of the things I could think of that offered a sense of safety and spirituality to grow long after I’d made my exit.
And perhaps it’d only been a few days since I’d made my formal complaint about Padre Juan’s actions, but I hadn’t heard a word from any of the officials I’d copied on that message.
To say my time with organized religion had caused a case of harsh spiritual disillusionment was putting a positive spin on the matter. In truth, I’d found more God in loving Tressa than decades spent on my knees in prayer.
With her, I sought God in life. In nature and people and compassion and community and family.
Family.
For the first time in my life, family was on my mind. She filled me up with so much love, my cup overfloweth, the generosity of it suddenly big enough to feed an entire army. Or heal a whole country. Loving a wild, reckless, rebel heart of a woman was the very best decision I’d ever made.
The notion of a family with Tressa shook me to my very core, and like a revelation, a quote paraphrased from the book of Esther entered my mind.
Perhaps this is the moment for which you have been created.
Esther, displaced from her homeland, found solace in service and courage, in an unwavering love for her people. I’d always believed that God provided each of us divine moments to alter circumstances. It was our responsibility to be ready—or he would find someone else. Then, I wasn’t the man she needed, I was a chipped shell trying to hide the many cracks in my belief. Yet now that we were side by side, the desire to build a world of love around us, to treat religion as a verb, and act through a lens of compassion and kindness, had become my new mission.
I’d been feeling for a long time like my religion had been hijacked.
But somehow, through her, I’d found transcendence.
